St. Johnsbury Caledonian. [volume] (St. Johnsbury, Vt.) 1867-1919, 1887-04-21
ADNA C. DENIsON.
Names Pioneer Paper Maker Caledo-
mia County Row

Few men in Maine have lead an ac-
tive business life for so many years as
Adna G. DenisOn, the pioneer paper
manufacturer, whose fortunes were re-
Gently overtaken by disaster. He is
now ~ years old and he started in
business when he was only fifteen. In
the general blueness which pervades
this village at present, one hears more
sympathy expressed for him than for
any body else who suffers by the fail
ure-sympathy for an old, kind and
still vigorous man, who has just seen
the work of long life tOppled over
like a house of cards.
Mr.. Denison is VermOnter. His
father was a farmer who lived in
Burke, Caledonia county. He was one
of the first settlers of the county. When
Adna c., was Is years old he was EN-
plOyed as clerk in a general store in
the neighboring town of Sutton. He
remained here many years. In lo42
he caught the emigration fever. Should
he go westward with the star of en-
pire, or come to Maine, was the ques-
ton. Some fancy impelled him to
come to Maine, so he loaded two teams
with his household goods and his fam
lily and left Vermont. His caravan
came through the White Mountain
notch to Fryeburg and kept on to Nor
way, where he decided to locate. Nor
way was then very small village and
the few traders there did business in a
small way. "Everything was one
hOrse," said Mr.. DenisOn to the writer.
Gail the traders supplies were carted
on teams from Portland and no one OF
them ever thought of going to market
with anything heavier than one
horse team, on which they trucked
back their supplies. When L started
l made peoples eyes stick out by put
ting a four house team on the road
and | rapidly built up very large
business. At this time L formed II
business connection with John M.
Wood, who had the contract to build
the Grand Trunk railroad. [ furnish
ed him with supplies for his men, and
| established stores in various places
as the railroad moved along. | had
stores at South Paris, at Bethel, at
GOrham, at Northumberland and North
StratfOrd.
81 made my start in paper manufac-
turing at Norway, in lS40. was in
duced to go into it by SanbOrn u Car
ter, the Portland book sellers, who told
me there was more money in it than
in the mercantile business. L run a
small mill at Norway and succeeded
very we'll, for three years. In 1851
came to Mechanic Falls. There was
little business here, then. One dam
had been built. Drake & Dwinal had
a small paper-mill on the Minot side.
There was also small, tumble down
saw-mill, which subsequently came in
to NV hands. Mr.. E. w. Filler and |
built a paper-mill on the Poland side
of the river, and afterwards bought
out Drake 81 Dwinal's mill. Our firm
was A. C. Denison & Co. Later on,
my son bought out Mr.. Filler, and the
Denison Paper Manufacturing Co.,
was formed. We kept making addi-
tions from time to time, and when we
failed we had three dams and six mills.
Five wears ago we started the pulp
mill at Canton.
.In 1873, we went into the rifle bust
ness, which turned out SO unfortunate
ly. My son was acquainted with the
Evans brothers of Norway, who in
vented the Evans rifle. They interes
ed him in it, and he undertook to help
build up a demand for it. When we
started, we did not think of making
more than dozen sample guns, just to
help the thing along, but we were told
so often that it was big thing and re-
ooivnd encouragement in so many
WAYS, and were assured with so much
confidence that we were drawn in
deeper and deeper and finally had an
elephant on our hands. We lost Il
good deal of money in the enterprise.
We made $1,000 or 10000 guns, but
could not sell them us we'll as we ex-
pected. The Evans rifle is Il splendid
gun, firing over 30 charges IL minute,
but we could not get it started right.
My son went to Europe twice, TO in
troduce it in the Russian, German and
English armies. If he had taken
enough money to bride some of those
European officials, the Evans rifle
would have been the crack gun of Eu-
rope, to-day. He found that many
palms must be gilded, before any ia
vOrable report on the rifle could be Sc
cured"
"When were the best times in tue
paper business 2" asked Mr.. Denison.
''Last January, when we stopped"
said he, promptly, but with a regretful
accent. ave never were in such il
good condition for making money as
we were then. We had improved our
mills, put our machinery in excellent
shape, had increased our production
very largely and had all the orders we
could fill. The month before we failed,
our production was $4,000 nearly
twice as much as we had ever turned
out i'll any month before" Mr.. Deni-
son said that the sole reason for the
failure of the firm was the lack of suf-
ficient capital to carry on their opera
tiOns. They we're SO cramped that
they could not tide over accidents.
Great changes have been made in
the manufacture of paper since Mr..
Denison started in the business. Said
he "When ran the mill at Norway,
made paper almost wholly out of
rags which cost or cents IL pound.
During the war, used a good deal of
rye straw and oat straw. We used To
make paper of excelsior, too. News
paper, which now is sold at Az to B
cents a pound, we used to get 10 cents
for, when started"
Mr.. Denison is now spending his
days on large farm in Poland, and
about three miles from the mills. Sam
Jordan drove me out there behind IL
high strung, dancing mare with a
record of 2.39 to wagon, that was i'll
the DenisOn stables and is a part OF
the property turned over to their cred
itors. Mr.. DenisOn's home is an old
fashioned farm house flanked by large
barns in which 20 head of cattle are
tied. He likes farm life and is as
proud of remarkably handsome HOl-
stein heifer "A he could be of big |